Foul scrawl hits Roxbury store
Racial graffiti fails to intimidate owners
A Dudley Square market that showcases goods made by minority artists was vandalized days before its spring opening with the spray-painted message “White Lives Matter.”
Owners of Black Market, which launched last summer, discovered the 4-foot letters scrawled on the side of their building Tuesday.
“It just takes the wind out of you,” said co-owner Kai Grant, who founded the marketplace with her husband, Christopher. “That just seemed to be an attack.”
Grant, 48, has been preparing the market for its spring reopening, scheduled for Sunday. She said graffiti has been a problem on the building and its surrounding areas, but this is the first instance in which the vandalism has taken a racial tone.
“We have patrons of all colors,” Grant said. “Everybody’s welcome here — everybody.”
Mayor Martin J. Walsh offered a statement on the incident:
“Any defacement of other people’s property is a crime, and will not be tolerated. I know we have it in us to do better, as I saw this weekend during One Boston Day — and as Bostonians we need to continue striving towards acting with kindness and goodwill every day of the year.”
Black Market operates as a weekend “pop-up” space for vendors to sell their goods on the weekends, similar to the SoWa market in the South End. Grant said the market generated upward of $400,000 in revenue over its 33 days of business last summer.
Grant said there are no suspects in the crime, and she and her husband are in the process of filing a police report.
She assured patrons that the market will open as planned Sunday.
“I’m four generations Roxbury. We’re not going anywhere. We are here to stay. We are here for a purpose,” she said. “Nobody is going to try to bully us out.”
The city’s Graffiti Busters will coordinate with the owners to restore the wall.